


The Morning After the Night Before

by mystiri1



Category: Final Fantasy VII
Genre: Alcohol, Drunk Sex, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-09-21
Updated: 2010-09-21
Packaged: 2017-10-12 01:45:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,126
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/119416
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mystiri1/pseuds/mystiri1
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Drowning his sorrows gives Zack a new problem.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Morning After the Night Before

Vacation? Yeah, right. Just because he was usually a cheerful, easygoing sort, didn’t mean he was stupid. He’d noticed the Turks, and didn’t believe Cissnei’s cheerful, “We’re on vacation, too!” for a minute. A vacation with ShinRa paying all the expenses wasn’t some kind of bonus, or even a goodwill gesture. It was an attempt to keep him out of the way while they decided just how they were going to spin –

Zack cut that thought off abruptly. He didn’t want to think about that. Didn’t want to remember what had happened.

Being unhappy and angry wasn’t a natural state for him. He didn’t know what to do, what to say, how to behave. And, glancing around the colourful confines of a beachfront bar in sunny Costa Del Sol, damned if he’d be that miserable drunk sitting in the corner while everybody else had fun.

Nobody made anybody happy by being miserable, not even themselves.

He picked up the menu of trendy, frou-frou little cocktail drinks that sat on the bar in an equally trendy and frou-frou little plastic holder with palm trees on the side. If ShinRa was picking up the tab, there was no reason to go easy on them.

He usually stuck to beer, something he’d snuck more than a few of back home in Gongaga. It didn’t do much for him these days, but there was a comfort in it. If he needed something harder, there was Kunsel’s tequila; the other SOLDIER always seemed to have at least a dozen bottles stashed in his room, and was the perfect companion for getting drunk with. He didn’t recognise half the ingredients in some of these concoctions beyond the obvious: rum and various fruit juices. And they all had the silliest names.

With a grin, he decided he’d just work his way down the menu.

In very short order, Zack had worked his way down from Angel’s Kisses and Dragon’s Delight to an unlikely concoction called a Mako Shot – and if they were really like that, SOLDIERs would bitch less about going in for them – followed by Purple Passion and a Silver Bullet. The last made him think of Sephiroth, and he tried to imagine the General lying on the beach with a cocktail glass, completely with a little umbrella and plastic trinket hanging off the side. It didn’t work, but primarily because it was just so hard to imagine Sephiroth in anything but black leather. Leather wasn’t exactly beachwear.

He snorted as he tried mentally placing him in some brightly-patterned swimming trunks. They looked incredibly garish against all that pale skin. For some reason Zack’s imaginary Sephiroth was scowling and still armed. Maybe it was just as well Sephiroth didn’t hang around beach resorts, because surely somebody that pale would burn rather than tan.

With another laugh, he moved onto the next one. Tail Shaker. There was a note beneath it that it was sometimes called Choco Rocks instead, and then the list of ingredients. Rum and a few other things, with the usual florid descriptions. Rum was good, and so were Tail Shakers, he decided a few minutes later. It was a little tangy, with an aftertaste that he couldn’t quite place.

Before long, he’d tried a Zephyr, and reached the end of the menu.

What now? he wondered. Zack felt pleasantly warm, so a few of the ingredients in those harmless-tasting drinks must have a higher alcohol content than he’d thought. But he was still a long way from actually being _drunk._ He ordered himself another Mako Shot, and two more Tail Shakers.

He was on his sixth Tail Shaker when the bartender gave him a concerned look. “Hey, buddy, maybe you should go a little easier on those things. You do know what’s in that drink?”

A _very_ high alcohol content, then. “Don’t worry,” Zack assured him. “I’m a SOLDIER. I can handle it.”

The bartender muttered something that sounded suspiciously like, “I tried,” before turning to serve somebody else.

* * * * *

  
Zack’s head didn’t hurt when he woke, but it did feel suspiciously heavy. He wondered just how much alcohol he’d consumed to get the SOLDIER version of a killer hangover – not that bad by most people’s standards, which meant least all that mako was good for something.

He wasn’t in his bed, although a brief moment’s thought reminded him he was in Costa Del Sol, and it wouldn’t be his bed, anyway. But it wasn’t the lush king-size bed at the ShinRa Villa, either. There was the weight and warmth of another body beside him. He must be in one of the hotel rooms above the bar, he decided. Not a bad way to end an evening’s drinking.

He turned his head, and froze.

There were more than a few people who’d swear Zack couldn’t be quiet if he tried, but he managed to slip out of the bed, dress, and leave the room in total silence. His eyes were wide and a little stunned as he made his way towards the stairs.

He was a country boy, so he’d learned the basics young. Coming to Midgar had taught him that a lot existed beyond the basics, and in more variations than he’d thought possible. SOLDIER expanded his horizons yet again, because you’d have to be blind, deaf and dumb not to notice some of the things going on, and Zack thought of himself as quite cosmopolitan.

Just not _this_ cosmopolitan.

The first person he bumped into downstairs was the bartender from last night, carrying a crate of empty bottles outside. He had a brief impulse to run and hide in total embarrassment. Did this guy know what he'd done? But he'd already been seen, and running now would be worse. Instead, he asked what he should have the night before.

“Okay, what’s in those drinks?”

The bartender looked at him. “The Tail Shakers?”

“Yeah. Those.”

“Rum, lemon juice, lime cordial, and Boco Gold liqueur.”

Zack frowned suspiciously. “What’s that last one?”

“It’s a cream liqueur. Has a number of ingredients, but the important one is Zeio Extract.”

“Zeio Extract?” he echoed. Why did that sound oddly familiar?

“Yep. It’s made from Zeio nuts.” When Zack still looked blank, he prompted, “You know, what they use to get chocobos to breed?”

Zack groaned. Oh, _shit._

“Yep,” the bartender continued, sounding quite smug, and Zack could see the _‘I told you so’_ written across his face, “a few of those in you, and you’d be surprised what starts to look good.”

Alcohol made from Zeio nuts, Zack thought with a grimace. What kind of person would come up with a crazy idea like that?

At least, he consoled himself as he headed back to the villa, it hadn't been a chocobo.


End file.
